I don’t know if I’ve made this clear or not, but I find people who take their fandom too seriously to be absolutely hilarious. As a Star Wars fan, I find it perplexing when other fans take up arms at any hint of irreverent criticism concerning the franchise. Are we not fans of the same fun, cheesy, flawed films? Because I don’t really have a problem admitting that the Star Wars movies (all six of them) are far from perfect. (And yes, the same goes – perhaps even more so – for the Expanded Universe. Embrace the pain! And chill out.)
So, naturally, I take great joy in Jezebel’s takedown of over-serious Twilight fans. Please, don’t let this happen to you. Do you see how ridiculous it looks? And while I’m not saying you have to lay down and take everything, it doesn’t hurt to laugh a little at the expense of what you love. Because, let’s face it – sometimes it just deserves it.
I’m trying to think back to the beginnings of other franchises to see if they started out with the level of crazy we see with Twi-Hards. But really? I don’t recall that.
But totally. It is all made to be mocked, even as we obsess over it.
I really think that much of the issue with the Twihards is that, for many of them, this is their first serious fandom. I remember my first serious fandom– little movie called Star Wars, you might’ve heard of it– back in 1996. I was a young teenager, deeply in love with my shiny (not sparkly) new fandom, and couldn’t bear a single word to be said against it. I kept my crazy confined to the AOL Star Wars folders, though, not out in the open like this, for which I am profoundly grateful.
Yeah, I’m willing to give the Twihards a lot of slack because a lot of them are so young. Online or offline, we all did dumb shit at that age. But when you have the 40-year-olds… Even it IS their first ‘fandom,’ they ought to know better.
Yeah. I should restrict my comments to the Twi-Moms.* One just expects a modicum of common sense from adults. But they lack the ability to put parameters around it.
I’ve been pretty silly for Star Wars and Stargate, but I know where the line is.
* Twi-Moms are the species of adult women Twilight fans who can’t seem to recognize reality exists.
You know, I kinda get where they’re coming from. I get really annoyed when there is an excessive amount of negativity about something I’m fond of, like when XF started to tank (I was slow in believing it was tanking) or when people got upset about the direction Buffy took around season six. Mind you, snark doesn’t bother me. Snark and parody are FUN. But I don’t get why people would spend a lot of time harping on something they DON’T like, spoiling the fun for those of us who DO.
That said, the difference with my own negativity about Twilight is not just that I don’t LIKE it or am unhappy because Bella got with Edward and not Jacob or whatever, but because I find the message profoundly disturbing. And when something profoundly disturbing is being swallowed WHOLE by young people, that’s a problem, and one that really needs to be addressed. A lot. So at least they HEAR it.
If 40-year-old moms wanna enjoy it as trashy fun, fine. But when preteens who are just beginning to feel the blush of their first crushes see it as soooooooooo romantic, like the way relationships SHOULD be… that scares me. Enough that I’m gonna spend some energy being negative to counter that message.
Yeah, there’s a difference between being the kind of fan who can’t not tear themselves away whatever part of their focus that they dislike (can’t say we’re not familiar with that in SW) and poking fun. Sadly, some fans can’t seem to tell the difference between the two.